The idea of a computer virus is very old, but it gained real traction
as potential hosts (programs) enjoyed widespread adoption
and more distribution channels (BBCs, ?¬‚oppy disks, the ?¬?rst
shareware). The bane of early system administrators and every
dad who had fans of pirated games in the household, it elicited
the creation of an entirely new software class: the antivirus applications.
If viruses weren??™t bad enough for shaking user??™s con?¬?dence in
computer systems, with worms things went out of control. A
worm does not need a host program. Rather, it leverages known
exploits in network-enabled software for spreading from machine
to machine. Email clients, instant messaging (IM)
programs, ?¬?le-sharing software, even low-level network protocol
implementations can be leveraged as infection vectors.
The worm phenomenon highlighted many of the techniques and
the issues that can be found in modern security threats. The
infamous worm ILOVEYOU, one of the worst global infections,
A virus is a malicious
program that
can self-replicate
Worms brought
security threats to a
global scale
ILOVEYOU demonstrated
the power of
leveraging the
human factor
8 The Problem
exploited social engineering to spread.
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